13th Lux Europa Conference

© 2018 EPFL

© 2018 EPFL

Giorgia Chinazzo and Kynthia Chamilothori, PhD candidates at LIPID, participated in the LUX EUROPA 2017 conference which took place in Ljubljana, Slovenia from September 18 to 20, 2017

Giorgia Chinazzo presented the results of an experimental study conducted in collaboration with Kynthia Chamilothori, which investigated the effect of short exposure to colored light on thermal perception of people. The novelty of this study lies in the combination of visual stimuli presented in virtual reality and thermal stimuli reproduced in a climate chamber, creating a hybrid environment with thermal and visual stimuli from the real and virtual world, respectively. Two temperature levels (24°C and 29°C) were controlled in the climate chamber present on campus, while three visual conditions (orange, blue and neutral colored filters applied on the glazing) were displayed in the virtual reality headset Oculus Rift CV1. The results were highly positive, showing that the colored light led to different thermal evaluations. In particular, when exposed to orange light conditions at 24 °C, subjects felt warmer, less comfortable and judged the thermal environment as less acceptable than under the other colors at the same temperature. More information can be found at their co-authored conference paper.